What Non-Alpha Testers are Hoping for in Dirty Bomb

[ImageOmega]

I wanted to shed some light for both the developers and other alpha testers here on what others are saying regarding how they hope Dirty Bomb will play or what features they want.

There already exists a thread for testers and non-testers to post what they want to see in Dirty Bomb on the official SD forums:
http://forums.warchest.com/showthread.php/33384-What-do-you-want-to-see-in-Dirty-Bomb

There’s a lot of great stuff in there and I think it is important for Splash Damage to consider what people are asking for, especially those who have never touched the game.

Due to my site I have been getting a lot of feedback regarding core mechanics of FPS games in general (obviously, I can’t talk specifically about DB because of the NDA). What has been really interesting to me is that a lot of the things the readers have been posting and hoping to see in Dirty Bomb are issues we are currently discussing. Below I wanted to present some direct quotes from non-alpha testers regarding their thoughts on what they want out of Dirty Bomb.

So, some posts are long and some are short, and I will try my best to organize via topics. As a FYI, the longer ones are actually really good. Names of the posters are included for legitimacy (from DirtyBombers.com and its Facebook Page). Also, all quotes have been purely copy/pasted.

Movement

For me movement is most important because if an FPS is slow paced and doesn’t get my blood pumping easily then it will be replayed less than one that lets me move quickly and take out multiple enemies in succession before they can react.

Being able to circle-strafe, strafe-jump were huge in previous games. I just loved how the gunplay of RTCW and ET worked with circle strafing, accurate shot placement, and recovering from the shots you received. I only hope that the unlocks they referred to are similar to ET and only take place in the current map/campaign setting.

Match-Making

It is very true a game like DirtyBomb could have quite an impact with a match making system done right. I feel what you outlined is a great example, and needs to be done IN game. By this I mean there are already third party ‘providers’ out there that offer this kind of functionality for a lot of popular eSports games more or less. Most ran through eSports leagues themselves. For example ESL’s VERSUS system which can simulate match making, and also can include its anti-cheat protection from my understanding. Something similar would also be ESEA’s client with their pickup game/scrim server browser, however thats not as much of a match making system as it is a way to pug/scrim on servers you have to pick out. Obviously having similar functionality itself would be great for the game, and would probably work a lot better than requiring people to signup on a completely seperate site, and pay monthly for whatever service they add on top of the game itself.

Over all I found the article an interesting read, which highlighted important points. However all being held together by the main theme of ACCESSIBILITY=KEY

To start off I could not agree more with the ability to have dedicated servers. For one, creating unity withing the community: ” The ability to have a server that you can return to, with the same players, helps create a strong community withing the game.” I remember back when I use to play Wolfenstein enemy territory, one of the things I love the most was being able to go back to the same server with the same bunch large group of guys. Win or loose you knew that it was going to be a good time spent. At the same time being able to jump in to a more casual modded servers, where you character would shoot lazers and jump 3x normal height.

I also found the idea of having a “play now” system alongside a server list to be essential, because it caters to the casual players. Whether we like it or not most online shooters core base is assembled by the casual players. “play now” which acts as a fast track to unranked match making: ”would be more for those people looking to get into a game quickly… for a weekend warrior trying to quickly jump into a server because he has 20 minutes of uninterrupted gameplay time.” I know a lot of the time I just want to play the dam game and do not care who I am up against, or if its mid game. This along side server list defeats lobby base matchmaking, where i don’t have the time to wait 10 minutes to find me a dam match, based on X,Y, and Z. If i care about the particulars i go server diving or into ranked matches. Again this highlights accessibility.

Taking about accessibility, I liked the whole idea of how simply the ranked system sounded. However is one thing reading about it. and another actually experiencing it. Overall the idea of bypassing all the frustrations of trying to set up competitive matches, sounds great but it will interesting seeing how this is actually implemented. Rewarding and punishing players properly, seems great to. If you are playing ranked you should be held to a higher minimum standard. Taking the consequences whether good or bad.

Over all I believe Dirty Bomb has both competitive audiences and casual audiences well cover. Competitive with ranked matches ladders and tournament. Offering a vast array of tools to satisfy them. And Casuals with ease and accessibility to immediately play the game, or to be more picky with the sever list.

Id love to see similar queues to CS:GO. Casual/practice unranked and Ranked tryhard mode

Maps

A mix of long and short range fighting and also not too long maps, if its more then 15 minutes it can be a very long match if you use ABBA.

Public servers or competitive? For public, if you have included long-range weapons, either sniper rifles or the capacity to accurately kill opponents at considerable distances, then any map with open spaces has to also possess (preferably more than one!), completely sheltered approach route leading from one side of the map to the other. In short a safe method by which to get behind players who are sat at the back of the map; otherwise the round quickly proves to be a waste of time.

If there are limited long-range weapons, then there have to be multiple choke points - otherwise the map quickly becomes Somme-esque. Which might be fun for a very short time, but will quickly turn players off - at least the map, possibly the game…

For competitive play - especially within team-based fps games, the map has to have good choke points that force confrontations, but also multiple routes to objectives that can often lead to the division of resources. At which point decision making and the ability to rotate team members quickly, proves equally as important as individual aim.

Clarity is also key - in both limited map clutter for hiding and the ability to clearly see so that you can react dynamically. This also means that you have the freedom to introduce a small portion of a number of maps with ‘darker’ areas. These can therefore prove key to ambushes or transitions in gameplay, which therefore decide map dominance etc.

Map designs must also allow for fast, fluid gameplay, that even when beyond a certain point in the match, opponents still have the potential to retrieve victory from the jaws of defeat (type of thing…). Maps like these (hopefully) aren’t for slooooow -witted, CS-style camping players, but rather encourage gamers to get involved rather than wait forever in one small corner of a room.

Current games often have a tendency to show ‘reachable furniture’, but deny access - this is nonsense. If you’re going to make something at waist height, then it should be climable. If it’s in the map, then let it be used - this is a pet peeve of many current cloned fps games, that include significant scenery but which you can’t use to move around a map - pointless!

That last paragraph regarding maps is my favorite. =]

I hope this is useful for future discussions in understanding that some thoughts on how game mechanics should be are not just because we played the game and found it to not be like our favorite games of yester-year. People crave these things out of the game and have not even played Dirty Bomb. Some people even admit to missing the days of RTCW/ET, but heard so much about the “good ol’ days” that they are hoping Dirty Bomb becomes this for them. I think it is our responsibility as testers to keep voicing what we want to see so we can make this dream come true for gamers (ourselves and Splash Damage included).

[INF3RN0]

Good stuff. I think that those are pretty much universal feelings of every person who has already taken interest in the game.

[rivo3622]

nice, a good collection of quotes haha that last paragraph is my favorite part as well xD

[MrFunkyFunk]

Thank you for those quotes samples, it shows that some of what people have been saying here finds an echo in non alpha-testers hopes.
I too hope that someday I’ll be able to climb those chairs

[Anti]

Interesting stuff, thanks for putting this together.

Out of interest do you have much of an idea where folks are coming to your site from ImageOmega? Do they tend to be RTCW, ETQW, W:ET fans or is it quite a mix?

[ImageOmega]

Out of interest do you have much of an idea where folks are coming to your site from ImageOmega? Do they tend to be RTCW, ETQW, W:ET fans or is it quite a mix?

I do have this forum thread up where people posted their previous gaming obsessions or how they got started: http://dirtybombers.com/forums/topic/introduce-yourself-and-help-grow-the-community/

This is just a small sample, but I’d say the majority of people mention the following three the most: Quake, RtCW: and Wolf:ET

I know I received a lot of new users thanks to Warwitch plugging my site during the RTCW Anniversary Cup, so there is good amount of RtCW players lurking. And as an FYI, when the Echo reveal was released I picked up quite a few along with the mentions direct from Dirty Bomb blog/facebook thanks to badman.